Rainy Days
by Zannen
Summary: Luigi has always followed his brother. And it has always put him in trouble. Short oneshot written for Camp Hyrule 2006. Go Cabin 5: VNauts!


**Rainy Days**

It was raining in the Mushroom Kingdom. It wasn't flooding (yet), but it was just enough to keep every relatively sane person indoors. Unfortunately for Luigi, his brother Mario wasn't exactly sane. His older brother had an addiction to adrenaline and loved to find new ways to try and kill himself. Sometimes he succeeded and sometimes he didn't. The one constant was that Luigi was always hovering in the background, ready to force feed a 1-up mushroom down his older brother's throat whenever that happened.

_Someday, I swear I'll stuff a mushroom in his windpipe when he's asleep. No…when he's eating breakfast, I'll jump over the table and just jam it down his throat. That way I can see his eyes bug out._

The younger Mario Brother thought of pleasant things like this as he trudged after his robust older sibling through the mud and rain. Mario kept moving his short legs, for the most part ignoring the sad plod of Luigi's boots. It was only when he couldn't hear that plodding anymore that the red clothed man turned and frowned.

"What is taking you so long?" he shouted. "It's not raining that hard and I've got to go save the Princess!"

"Princess Peach is in another castle!" Luigi shouted back. He shifted the heavy pack to his other shoulder. "She's back home, in front of her fireplace drinking cocoa and away from this storm! Bowser's not doing anything right now. No one's doing anything outside right now but us! What did you put in this backpack anyway?"

"Just the usual: mushrooms, 1-up mushrooms, fire flowers, koopa shells, a few beans from that Beanbean Kingdom adventure we went on, my steel-toed boots, the gold I got from those goombas I fought a while back…" Luigi slapped his hand against his forehead at Mario's reply. His hat made a strange squishing sound and he felt an extra sheet of water cover his face.

"Don't tell me you've been robbing the corpses again…" Luigi sighed. His head snapped up as he remembered the only people they encountered so far. "Wait…the goombas you fought _today_?You mean the little family of goombas that were taking shelter under the trees at the edge of the forest? The ones who were minding their own business until you beat the living snot out of them?"

"Hey!" Mario objected. He grabbed Luigi's arm and began dragging him where he wanted to go, talking the whole time. "One of those goombas grabbed my leg and started yelling at me. Then one of his cohorts grabbed my other one and started yelling as well. I was in danger of falling down so I kicked them away. They attacked me first!"

"First of all, the goomba who grabbed you was Goombario. The other one was Goombaria," Luigi sighed. "Remember him? He helped you save Peach from Bowser when he got the Star Rod?"

"I remember being all juiced up with power and stars talking to me," Mario laughed. "Man, that was a trip! More than that talking doll or those airships the Koopa Kids always get to ride around in."

"Yeah, whatever," Luigi dismissed his brother's power trip reverie and continued. "Second of all, they weren't attacking you. They were saying hello! Then you just killed them! Just like that! Why aren't you in jail yet? You've basically killed off the _entire_ goomba population in the Mushroom Kingdom!"

"I've got a paper promising permanent pardon presented by Princess Peach to me, Mario Mario. It's legal and everything," Mario grinned as he said that. A thoughtful look went over his face as something occurred to him. Luigi was just glad that they stopped walking. "Hey, Luigi…how can goombas grab onto things when they don't have hands?"

Luigi's reply was cut off by a large burst of lightning that landed a foot away from them. Thanks to Mario's quick reflexes—honed by years of dodging enemy attacks—they both jumped away from the strike. Mario grinned up at his taller brother and laughed in exhilaration. Luigi simply looked down and sighed. The sigh became a sound of panic as he tried to move his feet but couldn't.

"Mario?" Luigi asked as he began tugging at his legs. "Can you move your feet?"

"That was awesome! I can't believe that. It was _right there_! I—what did you say Luigi?" Mario stopped his excited chatter and looked his brother right in the eye. "Hey…did you get shorter or something?"

"NO!" Luigi shouted. He pointed to their feet. "I'm _sinking_! We landed in quicksand, you idiot!"

"What's quicksand doing in the forest?" Mario wondered. The two brothers sank further into the sand as rain continued pouring down. "Ah, well…I'll just jump out."

Luigi watched in amazement as his pudgy brother began jumping out of the sticky sand. The technique actually worked and soon Mario was standing three feet away on solid ground. Unfortunately, the jumping moved enough sand over to Luigi's side that the man was now trapped in quicksand up to his neck.

"Don't worry Luigi!" Mario assured his little brother. "I'll find some wood and make a bridge and free you! I will return, I promise!"

"No!" Luigi yelled back. "There's some wood over there! You don't have to…run so fast in the opposite direction."

Luigi looked down at the sand covering his chest. If he didn't move, then he could probably survive until his brother came back. Probably.

"He'll definitely forget about me once he sees a new person to fight," he grumbled. "Mom _said_ he had adrenaline issues, but Dad was _so_ sure it was just a phase. This is _just_ like that time at Camp Hyrule when he left me in the Lost Woods."

The hellish memory returned to Luigi and he bent his head in remembered pain. He'd been lost for a whole day before anyone found him.

"At least that horse isn't here to eat my hat."


End file.
